


Contrast

by Ladycat



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Hurt/Comfort, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-11
Updated: 2014-02-11
Packaged: 2018-01-12 00:28:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,688
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1179744
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ladycat/pseuds/Ladycat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Everything pales before the translucent images of Sheppard's movements, his actions, reactions, plotted and predicted, broken down into mathematical possibilities because he knows, Rodney knows what this is.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Contrast

Everyone says that Rodney's not observant and they're right, of course. Entire operettas have been carried out before his oblivious eyes, human stories woven and picked apart to frayed and bitter nothingness in the space of a second.

But they're wrong, too.

Most of what Rodney misses is inconsequential to his work, which means it's inconsequential to his life. He doesn't care who's making big, soft eyes at whom, and even when he flirts with heavy, ham-handed actions instead of smooth and graceful, well -- that's inconsequential, too. He doesn't care about people, except for the chosen few who've worked their way into the tapestry of equations and stars that dance in his mind. The rest are so much white-noise and distraction, taking him away from the beauty he knows he can make real.

Some things, though, he picks up on. He's never spent as much time at SGC as he's wanted. Atlantis is his big break -- his only break, after having been shuffled from one lab to another without ever glimpsing the world outside. Even Siberia wasn't all that different, aside from the constant smell of cabbage and unwashed human in cramped quarters. But for all Rodney's only been there a handful of times, kept in the labs like the rat he is, he saw things. _Learned_ things that had nothing at all to do with the curve of Samantha Carter's smile, or the understanding that he will never, ever be considered better than her: because to everyone else who isn't Rodney McKay, intelligence alone is not enough.

When he's asked to join the off-world teams in their new home -- blue, everywhere is so blue, shifting and shimmering until he can see all the colors within, like refracted light -- he can't help but dredge up memories and make comparisons. A lot of details are superfluous, dismissed after days turn into weeks, and weeks bleed into months of exhaustion, adrenaline, and rock-solid trust to those few he accepts.

Other things remain.

Jack O'Neill is a loud man, for all he can go as still as a deer, vanished into darkened foliage. He's tall, jaw heroically square, with bright eyes that never flinch or waver. Rodney's not stupid enough to think there aren't hidden depths there, darkness's that hint of pasts he doesn't care to uncover, flaws worked into chiseled diamonds. He's a good leader, one of the few military commanders that isn't stupid enough to make guesses he can't, competent enough to step back and let others -- Carter -- handle what he doesn't know.

But it's not his interactions with the scientists that Rodney remembers so clearly. It's his interactions with the _men_.

A clap on the shoulder here. A punch to the arm there. Manly, companionable patting, the kind Rodney's not used to seeing except when he goes back to Canada. Hell, the whispered, chuckled memories of bear hugs and feet that swept uselessly against a beaten floor. These were a few of Jack O'Neill's favorite things, casual connection with the men he'd give his life for, the ones who'd give theirs for him.

Rodney knows he didn't get that before. Then it was all through the looking glass darkly, academic problems with applications that never stopped him from getting his next cup of coffee or a soft bed at night.

He gets it now. Oh, does he get it now.

But Sheppard doesn't touch anyone.

He doesn't shy away from it, stepping into Teyla's grasp as easily as he does everything else, accepting Weir's desperate hug, her thin, numb fingers turning white against his shoulders -- he never runs from it. Never hides when he _does_ have to reach out, warm skin glancing skin. But he never initiates it, never seems to want it. Only when it's necessary. Only when he can't avoid it.

Ford has become everyone's favorite back-slapper in compensation, stepping into shoes he knows how to fill. He's SGC to the core, off-world over a hundred times before he ever went to another galaxy. He knows O'Neill's style, knows his rhythms and patterns, the friendly clasp, the reassuring shoulder-nudge, and so long as he doesn't try to hug _Rodney_ again, Rodney won't call him on it.

Rodney doesn't really think anyone's noticed, regardless. Sheppard isn't Jack O'Neill, doesn't think or act like him, and most people seem to be okay with that. There are other things that make Sheppard worth it -- _worthy_ \-- an irreplaceable cog in the wheel he, and Elizabeth, and Rodney have fashioned. 

But now that Rodney sees it, now that he knows what should be there and isn't, he can't stop focusing on it.

It haunts him, ghostly playback looping behind his eyes, distracting him from the vital, imperative things he should be worrying about instead. Everything pales before the translucent images of Sheppard's movements, his actions, reactions, plotted and predicted, broken down into mathematical possibilities because he knows, Rodney _knows_ what this is. He's seen it before, hell, he's _been_ it before, and he wants nothing more than to push through those too-careful walls, batter until his nails break and his knuckles bleed, because even if it's pain, it's _feeling_.

When he gets his chance, he almost lets it slip by. His bravado is good, better than most, but certain things take true courage and Rodney knows just how little of that he has. Numbers, equations, the laws that build the worlds that fracture and crumble all around him -- he can be arrogant about that, because being arrogant means being _true_. Means being _right_.

People, Rodney doesn't know. Not really. His guesses are usually wrong, his theories washed out before the first trial, and he can't be wrong about this. He just can't be.

He thinks about making it suave and cool, something easy to pass off in case he's wrong -- but doesn't. Thinking like that is thinking like O'Neill or Carter, who know how to be subtle, graceful, nimbly twisting words into acrobatic feats of casual perfection.

Rodney can't do any of that, and he thinks -- hopes, whispers prayers to scientists long gone, half of them as bad or worse with others as he is -- Sheppard can't, either.

He doesn't pass it off. There's no deception, no staring off into space like his fingers aren't pressed into the crook of Sheppard's arm, warmth burning against the tips as Sheppard shudders once and then goes still. Rodney meets his gaze, watching the nova-spread of hazel shrink until there's nothing but green, pale and fathomless, flicking over his face like Rodney's got all the answers written there.

For all he knows, they could be.

They're interrupted, of course, and Rodney's heart thuds dully in his chest because he's blown it. There's nothing but studied disinterest in Sheppard's gaze now, his body only yards away but still miles and miles grow up between them, the walls hardening into trinium alloy, unbreakable. Rodney doesn't curse himself, doesn't wallow or sullenly castigate himself. He knows better. He's not fifteen, a callow swain rejected. He's an adult, with responsibilities and things to do, and Rodney has always been better than people suspect at working with those who dislike him.

So long as they aren't stupid, anyway.

It won't change, Rodney knows. He won't let it, and he knows -- respects, _admires_ \-- Sheppard won't, either. They need each other, even if it's just as Chief Scientist and Commanding Officer. But the arguing that Rodney's always suspected to be foreplay, the banter the nurses call _snarky_ , and the light in Sheppard's eyes when they verbally spar over something irrelevant, irreverent, and _fun_ \-- 

No one has to know he's mourning.

They're given rooms that night, actual beds that aren't filled with rushes and bugs, but feathers so like down that Rodney's mind can't retain the local name for the not-geese in question. Each one to each bed and Rodney strips off to his boxers without thinking, secure behind his very own locked door.

That unlocks without so much as a squeak of protest.

He doesn't say anything. Sometimes, some things, he gets, the right synapses making the right connections in time. He just rolls onto his side, silent mantras of _please, oh god, please_ quickly obliterated by each breath that isn't his own. The bed dips and settles, and Rodney finds his nose buried in hair that is scratchy and tickling and smells of salt-air, body warmed as one long, unbroken line of skin presses against his own.

His arm moves over hips that are too pointed, flesh paring back over bone, fingers finding whorls of flat curls to touch, fingers thinner and longer than his own tangling so that palm rests softly against palm.

They breathe together for a long time.

When he wakes, there's a nose against his jaw, a heavy weight over his chest, and legs rough and hairy against his own. There's not a millimeter of space between them, melted into each other like ice cream on a hot summer day, and Rodney's warm, almost too warm. He doesn't complain. Just runs a finger down the line of Sheppard's spine, feeling bumps and dips, hard nubs to stroke over. Sheppard's breath hitches at the touch, and he settles more firmly against Rodney's body, immobile and perfect.

When Sheppard opens his eyes, they're just as greedy -- hungry, _wanting_ , needhavetake -- as his own.

Rodney plots as he dresses, pausing to lean into the brush of knuckles against his thigh, the drag of fingers over his neck even as Sheppard pauses for the same. He's -- _they're_ \-- not giving this up. Rodney's skin feels like it's burning, too tight and sensitive without Sheppard against him, and he knows Sheppard feels the same when he loops an arm around his waist before they leave, stubbled jaw rubbing redness into Rodney's collarbone. There has to be a way, Rodney thinks. He has to find a way.

Later, Teyla will ask Sheppard if he's cold, offering to go fetch their jackets abandoned in their rooms. Sheppard will smile, charmingly dismissive, and shift the topic before anyone notices.

And Rodney will press his fingers more closely, thumbing an arc over the small of Sheppard's back.


End file.
